⏸️ Bitmine to halt ETH purchases after reaching 5% target; U.S. CFTC proposed crypto derivative rules

Quick Take

• Bitmine now holds 6.02 million ETH (about 4.9% of total ETH supply) and plans to halt purchases after reaching its 5% accumulation goal.
• U.S. spot BTC ETFs recorded US$681 million in net outflows last week, reversing the $241 million in net inflows the week prior. U.S. spot ETH ETFs saw $542 million in net outflows, compared to $138 million in net outflows the week prior.
• U.S. equities posted weekly gains led by defensives, energy, and mega-cap tech, driving the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite to early-week record highs. Beneath the main index gains, market dynamics split sharply: investors weighed multi-decade high 10-year Treasury yields and a mid-week AI hardware sell-off against a broad Friday rebound that pushed major benchmarks back toward record territory.
• The S&P 500 rose +1.15%, Nasdaq Composite gained +0.64% week-over-week, and Dow Jones Industrial Average increased +0.93%.
• Key Market Drivers:
• Multi-Decade High Bond Yields: The 10-year Treasury yield peaked at 5.311% on October 5, marking its highest level since April 2002.
• AI and Chip Volatility: Semiconductor and AI hardware stocks tumbled Thursday (PHLX Semiconductor Index -3.39%) following OpenAI-related corporate and revenue updates. AI chipmakers (Nvidia -2.0% for the week, Micron -4.3%) dragged on growth indices before stabilizing Friday.
• Energy Rally and Refining Margins: Brent crude oil rose 2.4% to $104.72/barrel, while surging refined fuel prices drove significant weekly outperformance in energy refiners.  
• Telecom Spectrum Shift: Telecom stocks sank Friday after SpaceX announced plans to acquire nationwide low-band spectrum for Starlink Mobile. Major carrier stocks dropped (T-Mobile -13.3%, AT&T -10.8%, Verizon -10.1%), while tower operators surged (Crown Castle +15.6%).
• Sector and Style Dynamics:
• Defensive Outperformance: High-dividend and defensive sectors outperformed as investors sought shelter from high interest rates and chip volatility, with Utilities (+4.0%) and Consumer Staples (+3.6%) leading all sector groups.
• Tech and Telecom Lag: Information Technology lagged (-0.3%) on semiconductor hardware weakness, while Communication Services ended flat (+0.77%) amid telecom carrier losses.

Research Dashboard

According to our research dashboard, price and volume indices decreased -2.87% and -12.05%, respectively, while the volatility index skyrocketed 132.75% last week.

Index tokens saw mixed performance. Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) prices declined -3.24% and -7.02%, respectively. Polkadot (DOT) led price and volume gains, while ETH drove the volatility spike.

Polkadot launched its dotUSD stablecoin through its OpenGov process, with approximately 2.77 million tokens reportedly outstanding at publication. The initial design is backed by USDT rather than DOT, with DOT-backed borrowing planned for a later phase.

Chart of the Week

Bitmine holds 6,016,414 ETH, representing roughly 4.9% of total circulating supply. Chairman Tom Lee announced the company will end token accumulation once holdings reach 5%. Reaching that goal requires purchasing about 90,000 more ETH, which would take about four weeks at its Q3 average buying rate of 23,171 ETH per week. While ending these regular purchases removes a steady source of ETH demand, the overall impact on price will depend on broader market conditions.

Top-cap tokens displayed mixed performance last week, led by NEAR (+19.8%) and FIL (+16.0%), while BCH lagged (-10.2%).

NEAR Protocol (NEAR) surged following an endorsement from Bitwise’s CIO and a record $30 billion in cumulative volume on NEAR Intents, its cross-chain swap protocol. NEAR Intents also integrated Robinhood Chain, expanding its reach across the asset swap market.

Filecoin (FIL) rallied after announcing the end of its six-year token vesting program on October 15, which removes 66.7 to 68 million FIL annually from the supply schedule.

DeFi categories diverged, with AI and RWA leading the growth and DEX leading the drop.

News Highlights

Company News

• Quantofi announced the launch of its AI-powered crypto momentum analytics platform in partnership with Crypto.com Exchange, providing institutional-grade tools for data-driven trading.
• Crypto.com Exchange announced a strategic partnership with Insilico Terminal, a professional crypto trading terminal, enabling users to connect their Crypto.com Exchange accounts to Insilico's platform. The partnership expands Crypto.com's professional trading capabilities by with advanced execution tools at no additional cost to users.

Regulation

• The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) proposed rules covering leveraged, margined, and financed crypto transactions, including a proposed “crypto asset market” exchange category. The measures could provide clearer federal oversight for derivatives, though direct spot-market trading would remain largely outside the CFTC authority, leaving a significant regulatory gap.
• Greece proposed a 10% tax on individual crypto capital gains, with an annual exemption of up to €500, while crypto-to-crypto swaps would be excluded and staking, lending and liquidity-provision returns would face a flat 10% tax. The proposal offers a clearer tax framework under EU reporting rules, subject to consultation and parliamentary approval.
• The U.S. SEC approved a Cboe BZX rule change allowing Volatility Shares to list the first U.S. ETFs targeting 3x daily Bitcoin and Ether returns, up from the previous 2x limit. The products will use regulated crypto futures rather than hold underlying tokens, but are awaiting registration statements to become effective before trading. While the approval expands U.S. crypto market access, daily leverage resets, volatility decay, and futures roll costs make these instruments primarily short-term trading tools rather than long-term investments.
• Thailand approved rules allowing local asset managers to launch spot Bitcoin and Ether ETFs on the Stock Exchange of Thailand starting October 16. The funds must allocate at least 80% of net assets to a single eligible cryptocurrency and use locally regulated custodians, creating a domestic regulated access route while retaining investor-risk, borrowing and product-eligibility restrictions.

Adoption

• The UK government appointed Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, Morgan Stanley, NatWest, and RBC Capital Markets to lead a pilot for its first digitally native government bond, expected in Q1 2027. Issued through the Digital Securities Sandbox, the pilot will test distributed-ledger settlement and evaluate whether tokenized sovereign debt can integrate effectively with conventional cash, custody, and settlement systems.
• Standard Chartered plans to offer Singapore-based custody for selected cryptocurrencies, stablecoins, and tokenized RWAs to institutional and accredited-investor corporate clients. The move expands regulated bank infrastructure for digital assets in a major Asian financial center, though specific assets, launch dates, and regulatory approvals remain pending.
• Samsung planned to enable eligible U.S. Galaxy users to send USDC through Samsung Wallet to compatible wallets or bank accounts in more than 60 countries, using Solana and Sui infrastructure.

Others

• Zcash activated its NU7 upgrade on public testnet ahead of a targeted November 5 mainnet rollout. NU7 targets 25-second blocks (down from 75 seconds), redirects 60% of transaction fees to a future mining-reward reserve, reduces per-block rewards, and disables legacy Sprout transactions. Developers plan a mainnet decision on October 20; users with Sprout-held funds must migrate them before mainnet activation.
• Solana plans to reduce its target block time from 250 milliseconds to 200 milliseconds (five blocks per second) while lowering per-block compute limits to keep theoretical capacity broadly unchanged. Faster updates would reduce transaction delays and some trading-execution risk, though validators would face higher voting demands.

Catalyst Calendar

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